Freelance Blues

Every. Writer. Hates. Pitching. (Imagine you’re a puppy waiting at the dinner table for just one morsel of meatloaf to fall. “Can I work for you? Huh? Can I? Can I?”)

But Toure, who regularly appears on MSNBC and has penned features for Vibe and Rolling Stone, says freelancers better get over that aversion if they want assignments.

“Oh, I pitch a lot. I do,” the Who’s Afraid of Post-Blackness? author explained in our Media Beat interview. “I mean, I wanna let people know generally ‘I wanna work for you; I wanna work with you. I wanna do stuff, so keep me in mind.’ So, just that general, you know, sort of selling yourself… And even if those two, three, five things are rejected, you are top of mind for that editor.”

Toure also detailed his strategy for getting big names like Adele and Beyonce to open up on the record (he likes “question clusters”) and revealed what he was really thinking during that BET R. Kelly interview.

“It was about being a cat burglar and not letting him know that he played himself.”

You can also view this video on YouTube.

Part 1: Toure Lights Up the Twittersphere with a Debate on… Tipping?

Part 2: Toure Tackles Watermelon, Fried Chicken and Post-Blackness in New Book

Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

I think we have a new euphemism for intern, folks. “Possible compensation for acquired jobs will be discussed.” Thank you Fidel Films for giving us a lot of words to maybe acquire possible compensation discussions…something.

Full ad below:

PRODUCTION COMPANY SEEKING COPYWRITER INTERN (BELAIR)

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Date: 2011-06-02, 1:15PM PDT
Reply to: job-5jmzx-2417332990@craigslist.org ^{[Errors when replying to ads?]}

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PRODUCTION COMPANY SEEKING COPYWRITER INTERN

Fidel Films is currently seeking motivated and ambitious copywriter to join
our team.

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If you’re one of the writers chosen to be among Demand Media’s new roster of feature writers, who DM CEO Richard Rosenblatt said would be paid up to $350 a story, you probably have Google to thank for your salary boost. Recent algorithmic changes at Google deprioritized “content farm” stories from the likes of Demand Media and other sites like Examiner.com in its search engine results. According to The Wall Street Journal, those changes hit DM’s bottom line hard.

[T]wo “major” search algorithm changes in February and April affected Demand Media’s prominence online, resulting in a net decline in search-engine referrals for eHow of roughly 20%, and a 12% reduction in total page views.

“This was a real impact to our business, and we take it very seriously,” Mr. Rosenblatt said, though he stressed that Demand Media isn’t entirely dependent on search-engine traffic.

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